|
born 4 February 1896 in Vienna died 8 December 1938 in Nervi near Genua |
| © Bitter Lemon |  |
| 1913 - 1916 | boarding school in Switzerland; first suicide attempt; volunteers for military service; first publications; discontinues the study of Chemistry |
| 1918 | becomes a state ward (on the initiative of his father); gets arrested for petty theft; first stay in a psychiatric institution because of morphine addiction |
| 1920 - 1924 | lives with Elisabeth von Ruckteschell near Roncco/Ticino; joins the Foreign Legion; another suicide attempt; hospitalisation in Tournai/Belgium; relapse of morphine addiction |
| 1925 - 1936 | returns to Switzerland; works as gardener and freelance journalist; starts writing short stories and crime novels; in and out of psychiatric institutions; publishes "Kommissar Studer" and "Matteo regiert" |
| 1938 | moves to Genua; awarded first Prize for "Der Chinese" by the Swiss Authors’ Society; collapses on 6 December, a day before his marriage to Berthe Bendel |
